by Grace Dent
SATURDAY 26TH APRIL
I didn’t get out of bed much today.
SUNDAY 27TH APRIL
Carrie rang me yesterday morning and said the car cruise in Southend was blinding. Carrie said there was loads of people there doing burn-outs and donuts and the police turned up and everything. Carrie said Wesley Barrington Bains II turned up by himself. Carrie said he hung about by himself for most of the night ’cos Carrie was with Bezzie.
Carrie said in the end Wesley met a girl called Dee-Dee from Romford who has blonde hair and big boobs and a neon-blue Golf with glowing wheel arches. Carrie said he snogged her.
When Carrie told me this I put the phone down and then I put my Hip Hop Divas album on and then I got into bed and curled my arms round my knees and then I cried.
MAY
THURSDAY 1ST MAY
I haven’t seen Carrie much this week, except for at school and even then it’s like she’s in another world. It’s all Bezzie and me did this and Bezzie and me did that and then me and Bezzie went to Burger King and then me and Bezzie went to Halfords and then me and Bezzie went to South Mimms Services and it was well jokes ’cos Bezzie bought us both Kinder Surprise eggs and then Bezzie made the toy and it was a frog in a rowing boat and we called it Cyril and then we drove home and the police gave us a dirty look at the traffic lights ’cos of Bezzie’s exhaust pipe and that was proper hilarious and then Bezzie and then Bezzie . . . AND BELIEVE ME SHE CAN GO ON LIKE THIS ABOUT BEZZIE ALL BLOODY DAY LONG.
I miss the old Carrie Draper. Life is so crap right now.
SATURDAY 3RD MAY
Carrie was with Bezzie today. I went on MySpace and updated my profile with some stuff about me “Lovin Lif 2 the Max Rite Now + 4eva!!!” I am such a fake.
THURSDAY 8TH MAY
Today Carrie asked me what was up at school ’cos she reckons I’m being a bit off with her and giving her evils so I said, “Nah mate, I am so totally not giving you evils right?”
And Carrie said, “Well have you got an issue or something ’cos then we need to communicate about it?”
And I said, “Nah. And if I had something to say to you I’d say it to your face and not behind your back ’cos you’re my friend.”
So Carrie said, “Okay Shiz, fair play. Maybe I’m just a bit paranoid ’cos I’m nearly on my period.”
Then we linked arms and went to lunch together and we had chips and curry sauce with loads of ketchup and cinnamon buns ’cos it was Friday so they don’t sell all that healthy option crap. We sat in the lunch hall and I tried to talk to Carrie about stuff other than Bezzie. It was hard.
At the end of school we both walked home sharing her iPod and having a laugh, but when I got back home I realized she’d not even asked me what I was doing this weekend at all.
SATURDAY 10TH MAY
NO phone call from Carrie! Went on to my MySpace and clicked on to Carrie’s page to check out any new pics she has up. That’s when I noticed something that REALLY DID MY HEAD IN. Until recently, Carrie’s main picture was of me and her at Draperville messing about with strawberry sauce all over our faces with the message:
Heya every1!!!! Urm i dno wt 2 say in these things!! Im Carrie. Im 15! quite random! Choclite brown hair! U cn c frm my pics wt i look like!! I lurve you Shiraz Shiz Shoz Shizza! Complete legend. Lurve all the crap we do 2getha. WE RULE MAYFLOWER. SUPERCHAV ACADEMY 4EVA — he he he he NOT Rilly!!!! :D:D:D:D:D nowt else 2 say! leave me a msg nd ill chat 2 ya l8rz CARRIE xXxxXx
But now it says:
hey every1!!! So u no this is me Carrie! He he he!!!!. Bezzie Kelleher — OMG — you are my hunnybun . . . cldnt live wifout you in mi If, we’re eachothas sanity. I’m so glad I fnd u. Wen we go out we ave the bestest times . . . Southend Cruise omg hehehe!! love u more dan nefink!!! Cyril the Frog I luv him too!!! G-MAYES DETONATORS know yourselfs!!! I lurve you Shiraz Shiz Shoz too Complete legend. Lurve you 4eva xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I looked at that for ages and felt totally gutted. Bezzie is FIRST and I am SECOND. Then I looked at Carrie’s new pics. There were ones of her and Bezzie sitting on his bed. And one of them at South Mimms Services eating Kinder eggs. There were some of Wesley Barrington Bains II. He was sitting on the hood of a neon-blue car with his arm around a moody-looking girl who had longish straight white-blonde hair and huge knockers and a low-cut top on and loads of lipgloss. She was pretty, I suppose, in a well obvious Barbie way. It had to be Dee-Dee. Carrie has been hanging out with Wesley and Dee-Dee!
I switched the PC off and stormed downstairs and watched Channel U on my own. I must have looked sad ’cos when Murphy got home he made us both a banana Nesquick and let me win at Zombie Armageddon: Bloodbath II. I think I am depressed.
SUNDAY 11TH MAY
I was meant to do my English homework today, ’cos I totally promised Ms. Bracket that I would, but I got up and thought WHAT IS THE POINT??
I’m not a suck-ass. I’m not going to pass English GCSE. That A– she gave me for “writing to argue” was just a fluke. I don’t need GCSEs anyway ’cos I’ll work at Tilak’s or somewhere for a bit until I go on Big Brother or whatever. I’m sick of thinking about all this crap. At about 2 PM I went out to the shop to buy my mum some Pringles and a lottery scratchcard and I bumped into Uma Brunton-Fletcher coming out of Kebabish and she said, “Ya wanna come and cotch at mine?” and I said yeah.
Uma’s house is scary. They’ve got no garden gate and a smashed-up front wall and a busted fridge by the front porch and the front door is boarded up ’cos the police kicked it in at New Year so you need to go around the back. Their kitchen is always full of randoms ’cos Uma’s stepdad knocks out bags of skunk, so he’s always sitting behind some electronic scales at the breakfast bar with a cig in his gob and a roll of clingwrap in his hand and there are always at least three brindle Staffies roaming about and kids and toddlers of different sizes everywhere and no carpet on the lounge floor.
So me and Uma went in the living room and Uma got us both a Smirnoff Ice each, which I didn’t really want but I didn’t want to look soft. We sat on the couch and watched the DVD extras on Homicidal Psychopath in Manhattan where a woman was getting raped by a gang of ax-wielding thugs, and Uma said do I want a smoke, so I said yeah, even though I don’t smoke. I had a few drags and a sip of my Smirnoff Ice and I started to feel proper sick.
Then Clinton arrived home from wherever he’d been, looking dead pale, and he plonked himself down beside me on the couch and he said, “All right Shiz, not seen your mush for a while.”
And I said, “Yeah, been busy.” ’Cos I couldn’t tell him the truth that my mum says I’m not allowed in here ’cos they’re all rough as hell.
Then Clinton said, “’Ere, do you know anyone that wants to buy an American Pit Bull puppy? I got its Kennel Club papers,” and I said no. Then he said, “Do you know anyone who wants to buy a Taser?” and I said no and he said, “Do you know anyone with size nine feet who likes Ellesse trainers?” so I said no and then he left me alone.
After about three hours I went home and my mother said, “Where have you been?” and I just grunted like it was none of her business and said “Carrie’s.” Check me out, I’m a superchav.
WEDNESDAY 14TH MAY
Ms. Bracket is livid about the English homework. She started moaning on that I was “just beginning to shine” and I’m “wasting my potential.” She is mixing me up with someone who gives a crap.
Bezzie has bought Carrie a gold necklace with her name on it. Carrie wears it over the top of her school shirt and keeps playing with it all the time and looking mushy. Carrie reckons it means Bezzie is falling in love with her. If he was that in love he’d have got it from somewhere posh like H Samuels, not Argos where Wesley can get ten percent staff discount.
FRIDAY 16TH MAY
Carrie was going to the cinema tonight with Bezzie. They never invited me. I went round to Uma’s and we walked over to the bandstand at Goodmayes Park where Kirky and Dazzle and Minno from Lowbridge Academy wer
e. Dazzle had one of those mini-motorbikes that he’d borrowed off a kid in his projects and Uma brought some bottles of Blackcurrant Lambrella and we sat on the steps of the bandstand and ate chicken chow mein with our fingers and Uma texted everyone she knew to come over and meet us. Eventually Cassia and Ashleen came over who got suspended in Year Nine and ended up in reform school and they brought Knighty from the unit, who’s not allowed to come in the park at all now ’cos he’s got an ASBO, but he still does ’cos he just keeps his hood up and tries to keep it on the low.
We hung around in the park for ages and Cassia and Ashleen were shouting stuff at anyone who went by and trying to get grown-ups to go into Londis and get them ciggies and more booze but no one would. Then some emo-gothy-type kids walked past who looked a bit like my Cava-Sue and her Lewis, and Cassia and Knighty were shouting all this nasty crap at them and I felt dead bad then ’cos I should have said something to stick up for them but I didn’t ’cos I’m scared of Cassia ’cos she is a total rudegirl.
Then the park-keeper with the squashed strawberry nose and two policemen arrived together and one policeman told us to split into groups of no more than two and go home. Knighty made a swift exit ’cos of his behavior order and so did Dazzle on the mini-bike, but Kirky and Cassia and Ashleen started getting all gobby and saying they had civil liberties and it started to get a bit lairy then ’cos Cassia was pretty hammered and saying all sorts of nasty stuff. Then the other policeman said he knew it was us who graffitied on the bandstand — which it TOTALLY WASN’T ’cos the graffiti was about a year old — and he said he could get Forensic down to prove it and put us in jail.
Then he swung round and said to me, “And who are you? You’re a new face.” And I nearly died of fright but I just did the same stare that Uma does and shrugged, so he said, “What’s your name?”
So I said, “Veronica Fairish.”
And he said, “Well Veronica, I want this to be the first and last time I ever meet you.”
Eventually Cassia and Uma agreed to disperse and as we walked home Uma was laughing and linking arms with me and saying, “That was so wicked Shiz, you are a proper legend! Veronica Fairish! He he he!” And I walked along quietly and I felt crappy inside.
SATURDAY 17TH MAY
I called Carrie this morning but she was going to Romford to look at some new wheel arches with Bezzie and Wesley. She asked me to go but she said Dee-Dee was going so I said no ’cos I’m not being a spare part. I lay in bed for ages and thought about her and Bezzie and how things have changed since he came along and I felt pretty sad. Then I thought about Wesley and his green eyes. Then I thought about that cow Dee-Dee and her huge boobs. Then I thought how different life might have been if I’d just gone to bloody Southend and maybe worn some glitter eyeshadow and inflated my tits with panty-pads. Then Uma texted me and said: wanna go2 the mall? and I thought: not really mate, ’cos you’re a bit mental, but I couldn’t think of a good way to put that in a text that wouldn’t end up with a rubbish bin getting chucked through our window so I put on my McKenzie hoodie and my biggest hoops and went.
I met Uma outside KFC and she was with Cassia and Ashleen. Cassia was in a right strop ’cos she’d just tried to take some hair straighteners back to Boots and they wouldn’t give her even a credit note ’cos she didn’t have a receipt or a box. The irons had all crispy burned hairspray on them like they’d been used loads of times.
Cassia was saying, “So I said to her, you calling me a liar? Are you saying they weren’t a gift?! You wanna know yourself disrespecting me like that!” Then Cassia said she was going to wait about until 6 PM and give the silly bitch on the electrical counter a slap. I wasn’t sure whether she was kidding or not, ’cos let’s face it, Cassia ended up in reform school for headbutting Miss Coates.
We all walked off together into the mall and I wanted to go into Claire’s Accessories to buy a scrunchy, but Uma said we couldn’t ’cos she’s on their central database of banned under sixteens and it just causes loads of friction from the moment she goes in and that security guard starts getting all up in her face. So we sat around on the wall by the plants for a while and I felt quite scared then ’cos Uma and Cassia kept getting into stupid arguments with passersby who they accused of looking at them funny. Then Collette Brown from Cheeky’s Vertical Tanning Salon walked by. She had a little cream leather jacket on over a white jumpsuit and perfect hair and high-heeled boots on. I waved and smiled at her but she just looked at me and looked embarrassed then walked off well quick. “Who’s that silly cow?” said Uma. “She looks like a right slut.”
“Oh, no one,” I said. My cheeks were burning up.
Cassia stole two bright pink bottles of Rimmel Lycra Wear nail polish from Superdrug. She gave me them ’cos she’s already got seven at home. She says stealing them is her new game. I went home as soon as I could. Cava-Sue was in the living-room ironing a dress for yet another night out in central London. Mum was in the kitchen slagging Cava-Sue off ’cos the dress was too short and had a rip in it and wasn’t even new ’cos she’d got it second-hand off eBay.
“All right superchav? How’s Uma?” Cava-Sue smirked as I walked past.
“OH SHUT UP, CAVA-SUE, YOU BLOODY SMELLY EMO FREAK!” I shouted at her, then I stormed upstairs and slammed the door.
If Uma calls tomorrow I’m telling her I’ve been grounded until 2009.
SUNDAY 18TH MAY
Spent most of today in bed, with the dog under the duvet with me, reading OK! magazine and hoping Uma might forget I exist. Uma texted me THREE TIMES this afternoon seeing if I want to go to the Cash 4 Trash shop with her ’cos she’d “found” a digital camera and she wanted to flog it and buy some booze and go to the park. I didn’t want to go to Cash 4 Trash. It’s full of heroin addicts pawning their tellies. I didn’t want to go the park either ’cos that park-keeper with the strawberry nose looks proper depressed when he sees us. At about 6 PM there was a knock at the front door and when I pushed my face to the window I NEARLY DIED WITH SHOCK. There was a police car outside my house!! My heart started jumping into my mouth and I ran around my bedroom trying to find those bloody stolen bottles of nail polish so I could hide them in the toilet tank like they always do on Law & Order.
My mother answered the door, then she shouted up the stairs, “Shiiiiiiiiraz! Come down here RIGHT NOW!” I walked downstairs shoving my hands into my pockets. I thought I might throw up.
“You ain’t got Uma bloody Brunton-Fletcher up there with you, have you?” she said.
“No,” I said.
“See?” my mum said to the policeman. She looked at me. “The police are looking for Uma again. That Clinton headcase has told them she’ll be round here with you ’cos you’re her mate. But you don’t have nothing to do with Uma, do you?”
“No,” I said. I’m sure I looked like I was lying ’cos I was sweating like mad. I went back upstairs and got under the duvet and pulled it over my head.
I am officially retiring from being a superchav. I don’t think there is much of a future in it.
But what now?
JUNE
MONDAY 2ND JUNE
Got up at 6 AM today to catch the minibus to Tilak Foods for my work experience. Tilak Foods is in an industrial park in the middle of nowhere. I waited on the corner of Civic Close at 7 AM with a group of older women who were mostly Sikhs with long saris on under their parkas. There were also some Eastern European women in stonewash denim jackets and ski pants and neon sweatshirts, plus some Somalian ladies too. There wasn’t anyone my age on the bus at first, but after a few pick-ups a younger girl got on called Mercedes and we had to wait a minute while she finished her Slim. I felt quite scared on the bus ’cos I didn’t know anyone and no one talked to me. Without Carrie or Uma or Kezia I felt totally small and alone.
The Tilak factory is well big. As big as Mayflower Hockey Field used to be before it got sold. Tilak’s is freezing cold inside. Especially near the fridges and freezers. There’s a really pukey weird
smell all the time, but it’s not of bhajis or pakoras, it just smells like old chip fat. A bit like when Nan first got her deep-fat fryer and didn’t change the lard in it for a year. Minging.
I went up to the office and a woman called Mrs. Reman met me and she said, “You sixteen yet?” and I said, “Nah, fifteen,” and she tutted and gave me a bag full of clothes and told me to get changed. I had to wear a big pair of white wellies, a hair-net over my hair, a dark red hat and a massive baggy dark red boiler suit with white plastic buttons up the front. I looked in the toilet mirror and couldn’t believe how much of a dog I looked. I put some lipgloss on to try and bootilicious myself up but when I got outside Mrs. Reman said, “Strictly no makeup,” and made me wipe it off with a rough paper towel. Even bloody Mr. Bamblebury the headmaster has given up on lipgloss.
The factory is proper noisy, you have to say everything twice. Today they were making lamb kofta balls. Basically, there’s a big huge MASSIVE pan of mashed-up lamb gunk with a blade inside stirring it up and the mixture spits out a tube in the bottom into little balls. Then they go through an oven and then they plop out of the other end. My job today was observing the koftas being packed. You put six koftas in a box. Then six in another box. Then six in another box. Then when you’ve done six boxes they go into a much bigger box and you pull a lever and the box gets taped and sent off to get a label.